Historically, probability was studied by gamblers who wanted

to increase their winnings (or at least decrease their losses)

 Many decisions in
real-life situations are
made by assigning
probabilities to all
possible outcomes
and evaluating the
results.
• In the study of statistics, we are concerned
basically with the presentation and
interpretation of chance outcomes that occur
in a planned study or scientific investigation.
• Probability as a general concept can be
defined as the chance of an event occurring.
 Basic Concepts of Probability

A probability experiment is a chance process that

leads to well-defined results called outcomes.

 Sample Space is the set of all possible outcomes of a

statistical experiment and is represented by the
symbol S.
 Basic Concepts of Probability

 An outcome is the result of single trial of a

probability experiment.
 An event consists of a set of outcomes of a
probability experiment. It is a subset of a sample
space, usually denoted by capital letters.

 NullSpace or empty space (Φ , { }) is a subset of

the sample space that contains no elements.
random experiment…

the outcome is certain.

the outcome is impossible.

the outcome has an even chance of occurring.

the outcome has a strong but not a certain chance of

occurring.
 MutuallyExclusive. Two events are mutually
exclusive if they have no common element.
 Equally
likely events are events that have the same
probability of occurring.
A tree diagram is a device consisting of line
segments emanating from a starting point and also
from the outcome point. It is used to determine all
possible outcomes of a probability experiment.
Example
Experiment:
Flipping a coin and then flipping it a second time if a head occurs. If a tail occurs on the first
flip, then a die is tossed once.

S  HH , HT , T1, T 2, T 3, T 4, T 5, T 6
Exercises
Construct a tree diagram for the following experiments
and list the elements of their sample spaces.
1. Suppose that three items are selected at random
from a manufacturing process. Each item is
inspected and classified defective or non-
defective.
2. An experiment consists of tossing a die and then
flipping a coin if the number on the die is even. If
the number is odd, then the coin is flipped twice.
3. A coin is tossed until a tail or three heads appear.
 Theprobability of an event A is the sum of weights
of all sample points in A. Therefore,

0 ≤ P(A) ≤ ,1
P ( ᶲ ) = 0, and
P (S) = 1.
 Properties of the Probability

 theprobability of an event is a non-negative value; in

fact it ranges from zero (when the event is impossible)
to one (when the event is sure); the closer the value to
one, the more likely the event will occur.
 theprobability of the sure event is one (in other words,
the chance of a sure event is 100 percent).
Random Variables
and
Probability
Distributions
Activities : Coin Tossing and Breath Holding

Activity 1
 Toss a 1-peso coin three times and record the results
 Count the number of heads that appeared

Activity 2
Hold your breath and record the time (use a cell phone
timer and record up to the nearest hundredth of a
second)
Statistical Experiment – an
activity that will produce
outcomes, or a process that will
generate data.
 A random variable is a function that associates
a real number with each element in the
sample space. We use a capital letter, say X,
to denote a random variable and its
corresponding small letter, x, for one of its
values. Each possible value of X represents an
event that is a subset of the sample space for
the given experiment.

Note: Random variables are conceptually different from mathematical variables. A

random variable is linked to observations in the real world, where uncertainty is involved.
 Example

 Two balls are drawn in succession without replacement

from an urn containing 4 red balls and 3 black balls. The
possible outcomes and the values x of the random variable
X, where X is the number of red balls, are

Sample Space X
RR 2
RB 1
BR 1
BB 0
 Frequency and Relative Frequency Distributions of
the Number of TVs owned by City of Manila Families

Number of TVs Frequency Relative

Owned Frequency
0 34 0.068
1 316 0.632
2 132 0.264
3 18 0.036
N = 500 1.000
Definitions
A random variable is a variable whose value is
dependent to the outcome of a well-defined random
event or experiment.

 The possible values of a random variable are values

that are obtained from functions that assign a real
number to each point of a sample space.

 A discrete probability distribution is a table of values

that shows the probability of any outcomes of an
experiment.
Example

If H stands for heads and T for tails,

there are eight equally likely possible
outcomes in 3 successive tosses of a
coin. Find the probability distribution for
the number of heads.
S = (HHH, HHT, HTH, THH, TTH, THT, HTT, TTT)

Probability distribution

Number of
0 1 2 3
Heads (x)

P (X = x) 1/8 3/8 3/8 1/8

TYPES OF RANDOM
VARIABLES
Recall

A variable is any information, attribute,

characteristic, number, or quantity that
describes a person, place, event, thing, or
idea that can be measured or counted. A
variable can be qualitative or
quantitative; and a quantitative variable
can either be discrete or continuous.
Discrete Continuous
A discrete variable is a quantitative variable whose
value can only be attained through counting. It can
be finite in number of possible values or countably
infinite if the counting process has no end.
 Inan experiment, the outcome is said to be discrete
random variable if the experiment has only
countable or countably infinite number of outcomes.
No other outcome exists between two consecutive
outcomes.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7
A continuous variable is a quantitative variable that
can assume an infinitely many, uncountable number
of real number values. The value given to an
observation can include values as small as the
instrument of measurement allows.
 Inan experiment, the outcome is said to be a
continuous random variable if an outcome can take
an uncountably infinite number of possible outcomes
within a specified real number interval. Here, it is
always possible to have an outcome between any
two existing ones. 0
1
Discrete Probability
Distributions
Discrete Probability Distributions

 It is consists of the values a random variable can assume

and the corresponding probabilities of the values. The
probabilities are determined theoretically or by observation.
There are requirements for a distribution of a discrete
random variable.
 The listing is exhaustive (all possible outcomes are included).
 The
outcomes are mutually exclusive (The outcomes cannot
occur at the same time).
Two Requirements for a Probability Distribution

 The sum of the probabilities of all the events in the sample

space must be equal to 1.

 The probability of each event in the sample space must be

between or equal to 0 and 1. That is, 0 ≤ P(X) ≤ 1.

A probability distribution gives the probability for each value of the random variable.
Determine whether each distribution is a probability distribution.

𝑥
1. Does P(X) = (where X can take on the values of 0, 1, 2, 3,)
5
determine a probability distribution?
𝑥
2. Does P(X) = (where X can be 0, 1, 2, 3, or 4) determine a
10
probability distribution?
𝑥+3
3. Check whether the correspondence given by f(x) = for x =
15
1, 2, and 3 can serve as the probability distribution of some
random variable.

Example
Example

Find the probability distribution of an

experiment where the sum of the
number shown on a pair of dice in a
single throw is considered.
Example

A shipment of 8 similar microcomputers to a

retail outlet contains 3 that are defective. If
a school makes random purchase of 2 of
these computers, find the probability
distribution for the number of defectives.
Probability histogram of a discrete random variable
A probability histogram shows relative
probabilities of the sample points in the form of
a bar graph.

 Let
the x-axis denote the independent variable,
which is the set of sample points, and let the
y-axis denote the dependent variable, which is
the corresponding probabilities of the
samples points.
 PROBABILITY HISTOGRAM

P (X=x)
0.4

0.35

0.3

0.25

0.2

0.15

0.1

0.05

0 x
1 2 3 4
 Binomial Distribution
 A binomial distribution is a probability distribution with only two
possible outcomes: success and failure.
 Let p = probability of success, q = probability of failure, and n =
number of trials performed during an experiment of getting x
successes. The probability of getting x successes out of n trials
is given by
P (x) = nCx • px • q n – x .
 Binomial Distribution
 The probability mass function of a binomial distribution is given by

X Success Failure

P(X) p q

where p + q = 1.
 P (x) = nCx • p x •q n–x

 Combination is an arrangement of
objects/things without reference to the order in
which they are arranged.
 The number of possible combinations of r
objects from a collection of n objects is given
by the formula
𝒏!
nCr = 𝒏 −𝒓 ! 𝒓!
Note: Every arrangement in order of a set of things is called a permutation.
 n! (n factorial) = n • (n – 1) • (n – 2) •…•(2) (1)

 Evaluate the following:

a.) 5! = 5 (5 – 1) (5 – 2) (5 – 3) (5 – 4)
= 5 (4) (3) (2) (1)
= 120

b.) 8! = 8(8-1)(8-2)(8-3)(8-4)(8-5)(8-6) (8-7)

= (8(7)(6)(5)(4)(3)(2)(1)
= 40, 320

Note: nCn = 1, nC0 = 1, nCr = nCn-r

 Examples (Combination)

Evaluate the following:

8C3
1. 8! 8! 8(7)(6)(5!)
= = = = 56
8 −3 !3! 5!3! 5!(3)(2)(1)

2. 7C2 7! 7! 7(6)(5!)
= = = = 21
7 −2 !2! 5!2! 5!(2)(1)
 Example (Combination)
A shipment of 7 television sets contains 2 defective sets. A hotel makes a random purchase of 2 of
the sets. Let X represents the number of nondefective sets purchased by the hotel.

S = {DD, ND, DN, NN}

X (No. of Non-defective) 0 1 2
P (X = x) 1/21 10/21 10/21

P (X = 0) = (2/7)(1/6) = 1/21
P (X = 1) = (5/7)(2/6) + (2/7)(5/6) = 10/21
P (X = 2) = (5/7)(4/6) = 10/21
Example (binomial distribution)

 Fivefriends attended a volleyball varsity

teams tryouts. What is the probability that
only 3 of them will be selected if P (success)
= 60% and P (failure) = 40% for each of
them?

P (x) = nCx • px • q n – x
Example (binomial distribution)

A survey found that one out of five Filipinos say

he or she has visited a doctor in any given
month. If 10 people are selected at random,
find the probability that exactly 3 will have
visited a doctor last month.

P (x) = nCx • px • q n – x
Example (binomial distribution)

A basketball team has to play 3 games during

the elimination round of a tournament. What is
the probability that they will win:
a. 0 games?
b. 1 game?
c. 2 games?
d. all 3 games?
P (x) = nCx • px • q n – x
 Themean of discrete random variables, also
known as the expected value, is the weighted
average of all possible values of the random
variables. The symbol used for the mean is µ.

 Thevariance is a measure of spread or dispersion.

It measures the variation of the values of a
random variable from the mean. The symbol
used for the variance 𝝈2 and its square root 𝝈 is
called the standard deviation.
 If P(X = x) is the probability of every value of x,

1. Mean: 𝜇 = σ 𝑥 • 𝑃(𝑋 = 𝑥)

2. Variance: 𝜎 2 = σ(𝑥 − µ)2 • 𝑃 (𝑋 = 𝑥)

3. Standard deviation: 𝑣𝑎𝑟𝑖𝑎𝑛𝑐𝑒 = 𝜎 2= 𝜎

Mean µ = np
Variance 𝜎 2 = npq
Standard deviation 𝜎 2 = 𝑛𝑝𝑞
 Example

 Students were asked to estimate the length (in inches) of a table. The
errors in the estimated values were recorded and tabulated as
follows:

Error (x) 3 4 5 6 7
P(X = x) 0.25 0.10 0.30 0.15 0.20

 Find the mean error of this probability distribution.

 Determine the variance and the standard deviation.
 Example

 The report of a weather bureau on the forecast of the number of typhoons entering the
country’s area of responsibility is manifested in the following probability distribution.

Probability
No. of typhoons per month (x)
P(X=x)
0 0.15
1 0.35
2 0.30
3 0.10
4 0.10

 What is the average number of typhoon entering the country per

month?
 What is the standard deviation?
Example

 The number of shoes sold per day at a retail store is shown

in the table. Find the mean, variance, and standard
deviation of this distribution.

x 19 20 21 22 23
P(X=x) 0.10 0.20 0.40 0.20 0.10